The ABC-123 Murders
by mylovelymindpalace
Summary: A new serial killer is sweeping London, and time steadily dwindles away with each new murder. But what, exactly, is this grisly countdown leading toward?
1. Chapter 1

**New multi-chapter! Yay! I will be posting once weekly on Saturdays. The rest of the chapters will be longer. **

Any reasonable resident of London would be at home, in bed, on a cold January night when the wind howled down alleys like a pack of wolves. The cold, which sunk into your bones immediately, would be enough to deter anyone who would even consider venturing into deserted London streets at two in the morning. But a dead man is not most men. And he is certainly not reasonable.  
A man, grime-coated and ragged, crouched in a London alleyway. He was practically indiscernible, a darker patch against the darkness that was the dead of night. He was seated on his haunches, fingers twitching aimlessly like a drug addict's. He barely moved except for when his head would slowly turn, eyes sweeping the deserted alley. Another figure, equally as ragged, approached the first. He squatted next to the first man, reached in his pocket for a pack of cigarettes, and lit up. The pinprick of light from his cigarette was the only thing illuminating the darkness. His companion visibly relaxed as the vapors floated on the cool night air.  
"You know what to do." The newcomer muttered, never unclenching his teeth.  
"Careful now." The other man murmured, never turning his face to acknowledge his companion.  
The second man nodded curtly.  
"It's ready." He said.  
Molly Hooper peeled the latex gloves from her fingers, discarding them in the rubbish bin that stood next to the slab. The second glove caught on the diamond that she now wore on her ring finger. She smiled briefly at the reminder of who exactly was waiting for her upstairs. Seb was wonderful, an obstetrician she had met one day while eating lunch. Their's had been a quick romance. They had dated four months before he asked John for his blessing. Yet more proof that he was a sweet man. He had taken the time to find a man important in Molly's life to ask in place of her father. They had been engaged for a month.  
"Well Mrs Morris, we'll just return you to your nice comfortable spot until your family comes for you. I really am sorry that you killed yourself. I've seen suicide jumpers before…" Molly had a habit of talking to her 'patients'. She had been told that it was morbid, but she was usually alone during autopsies, as she was now. Molly pushed the body back where it belonged and sat down to file the paperwork. Suicides were always difficult, she didn't like performing autopsies on them. She used to become physically ill (Seb had said it was probably some sort of mental response, over empathizing). She was able to do them now, but she preferred not to know any details of the victims themselves. Especially the jumpers.  
Molly heard the doors to the morgue open and looked up to see her fiancé smiling at her from the doorframe. He was a handsome man, his face like something that Michelangelo would have carved. He was almost too handsome, she sometimes was unsure why someone like him would choose someone like her. His height was imposing, he was 6"4 at least, but in all honesty, it was Molly's favorite thing about him. It made her feel safe when he wrapped an arm around her between her waist and the top of her ribcage and drew her into himself. He had blond hair that was close-cropped on the sides but allowed to grow longer in perfect ringlet curls on top.  
"I saw your autopsy that you had to do today. Met her three months ago. She had a beautiful baby boy who died of sudden infant death syndrome…" He trailed off. "Sorry… I shouldn't have said that. You don't like to know. Anyways," He said, voice suddenly cheerful. "I have come to take you to dinner. Grab your coat love. We're going out!"


	2. Chapter 2

**My usual upload day is going to be Saturday, but as I won't be home tomorrow or Saturday, I'm posting a little early. **

TWO MONTHS LATER  
The gunman stood, fingers nervously twitching over his semi-automatic rifle. He had been waiting. He shouldn't be waiting. Where was this mystery man?  
"Relax Mikhail." A low voice murmered from the shadows of the abandoned building. The hit man shifted nervously from foot to foot.  
His employer stepped forward enough to see but remain unseen.  
"You did your best." The voice continued.  
The gunman nodded, eager to please. His bald head bobbed swiftly in the twilight gloom.  
"Unfortunately," The voice all but purred "Your best was no where near good enough."  
The bald man's face had just enough time to register shock, horror, and mortal terror.  
"Go ahead." The other drawled lazily.  
A single bullet tore through the hit man's jugular. His face was frozen in a death mask of fear. The other man swished his long coat away from the pool of blood that was forming under the dead man.  
"Very good boys."  
"Mikhail Stravinsky. Born November 3rd 1970, in London to Russian expat parents. His family returned to Russia when he was three. He moved to Scotland when he was nineteen and came here eight years later. Lived inconspicuously, never married, one daughter, sixteen, estranged."  
Sherlock nodded as Lestrade continued speaking.  
"And the body?" He asked tersely. Molly took over where Lestrade's knowledge gave out.  
"Found in an abandoned meth lab, no traces of the drug in his system. Killed by the bullet to the jugular, in fact, it nearly severed his neck. The fact that it didn't decapitate him is really amazing."  
Sherlock dismissed Molly's information with a wave of the hand.  
"Killer was a trained sniper, military, though some dabbling in big game. Do you have any photos?"  
The detective handed over the requested file.  
"The number and letter?" Sherlock  
pointed towards the victim's coat that was draped unceremoniously over him. A letter S was cut crudely into the fabric followed by a number 10. Lestrade shrugged.  
"We're not sure."  
"S10" Sherlock mused, flipping to the next photo in the stack.  
Sherlock lounged in his armchair near the window, his navy blue dressing gown pulled around his pajama clad figure, a cigarette heedlessly clutched between his long fingers. He took a drag occasionally, releasing the smoke into the already cloudy air of Baker Street. He heard footsteps and hurried to stub out his cigarette on the windowsill, but John was in the room before he had the chance. Not that it would have mattered, John would have smelled it anyway. The doctor took in his friend's condition at a glance. He might not have Sherlock's deductive prowess, but he could read his flatmate fairly well.  
"He loves her." He stated, moving to pick up his laptop.  
"Who?" Sherlock didn't look up.  
"Don't play that game. Seb. He loves Molly, she loves him, they are getting married, it's too late for you."  
Sherlock rolled his eyes and retrieved his gun from the mantle. He set to work oiling the inner workings.  
"I couldn't care less. If Molly doesn't allow this romantic sentiment to cloud her thinking she will remain as competent a pathologist as she is currently."  
John looked up from where he had been working at his laptop.  
"Enough with the crap Sherlock. If you weren't thinking about Molly, who were you thinking about?"  
Sherlock shrugged and shot a bullet carelessly out the window.  
"The case. With the letter and number."  
Sherlock remained in a position almost the same to the one he had assumed during his talk with John for the next two days. He rapidly smoked through four packs of cigarettes, deaf to John's protestations and Mrs Hudson's complaints about secondhand smoke. He was deaf to just about everything, really. His mind palace had temporarily become reality and he was cataloging and reorganizing at a furious pace. He was only shaken out of his self induced pseudo-coma by the sound of a text message buzzing on his phone.  
-Morgue. Murder. Urgent. -GL  
Sherlock was swiftly at the morgue. No one noticed how careful he was to avoid Molly's gaze.  
"Similar to Stravinsky in execution, that's why I called you. Normal lady though, young mother, twenty four. Her name was Lydia Morrissey, married to a Tyler Morrissey. She was found in an abandoned lot, bullet through the brain."  
Lestrade handed Sherlock the file he had organized for the case. A red H was painted on one side of the body, a number 9 on the other.  
"Pictures. Letter H, number 9."  
Molly looked over Sherlock's shoulder.  
"Is that…"  
Sherlock shook his head.  
"Spray paint. Blood would dry brown. Plus, the consistency is off."  
Molly shook her head as if to change her thinking.  
"No, I didn't mean blood. I think it's wall paint. I painted my kitchen a similar shade not too long ago."  
"Immaterial…" Sherlock shrugged.  
"Is it?" Molly mused.  
Sherlock was called to the morgue each day, and each day he was shown the body of another victim. Each murder was practically the same, a simple gunshot wound to a area of the body that resulted in immediate fatality. As far as murders went, they were fairly humane.  
"No I can't tonight."  
Sherlock looked up at the sound of Molly's voice. They were alone in the morgue. He had been deep in thought, the kind of thought where other people almost ceased to exist. Had he started a conversation with her? He didn't remember it…  
"No, I can't babe." Molly continued. Definitely not him then.  
"I have to help out with the latest autopsy for that serial killer case. Young guy, 17 or 18 I guess." A pause. "Yes, there were more letters and numbers. An E and an 8."  
Why had Molly's fiancé asked about the victim? Sherlock shrugged it off. He knew he shouldn't be listening in to Molly's private conversation, but if she were going to continue talking quite loudly it really wasn't his fault.  
"I know Seb… I miss you too. I promise to be with you more once this case is solved."  
Molly's tone had changed, softer now. He saw a faint blush creep  
up her neck.  
"I know. Talk to you when I get home."  
Sherlock looked up sharply. He hadn't known that they shared Molly's apartment. He couldn't help but feel a little disgusted by the thought, though he wasn't exactly sure why.  
"I love you too darling."  
Sherlock screwed his face up in revulsion. These pet names were unbearable and ridiculous. Molly tapped a button on her mobile, dropped it into her lab coat pocket, and turned back to the tissue sample she was examining as if nothing had happened.  
"He lives with you?" Sherlock asked, voice an unemotional monotone.  
"Uhm, if by 'he' you mean Seb, then yes, 'he' does."  
Molly had turned to face him, but Sherlock quickly turned his back to her, reaching for a nearby Petri dish.  
"I assume your relationship is of an intimate nature?"  
He heard Molly make a noise somewhere between choking and laughing.  
"And it matters to you because?"  
"It's a valid question." Sherlock huffed. "Good night Molly."  
Sherlock pulled his coat and scarf around himself and hastily left the morgue, leaving a shocked and slightly amused Molly in his wake.  
"It's a countdown." Lestrade shouted one afternoon as he stared meditatively at the photos of victim number five. The letters from each victim (S, H, E, W, I) were tacked on the wall and the number found with each victim was affixed to their picture.  
"Of course it's a countdown." Sherlock spat venomously. "A countdown to what?"  
He walked out of the Detective Inspector's office and towards the stairs.  
"S. H. E. W. I." He murmured under his breath. "Shew I. Sh Ewi. She wi."


	3. Chapter 3

The windows were illuminated, the bright, cheery yellow an almost garish contrast to the midnight black sky. A figure, a strong profile with unruly hair, cast a shadow on the window, the black shape standing out distinctly against the illuminated background. The man who cast it seemed oblivious, unaware of the two sets of eyes that were locked on him. The owner of one set of eyes tapped his feet nervously, fondling the trigger on his SIG P226 pistol. It was an aimless habit, something he had developed over his years as a mercenary thug.  
"Let's just get it over with." He growled.  
His accent was American, though it was obvious that he hadn't lived anywhere for a long period of time for many years. Many accents and phrases from various countries melded together to form his own peculiar language.  
"Not yet." The other man muttered quietly. "This is just surveillance."  
He wasn't avoiding Molly. Of course not, that would be ridiculous. He no longer needed to utilize the morgue as frequently as he once did. He could garner enough information from the crime scene, the photographs, and his own logic. Why would he avoid Molly? He dug through his mind palace for similar instances, anything that could give him a clue into what had changed. He had avoided going to the morgue after the fall… That was it. He was protecting her. Maybe this psycho serial killer would latch on to her. Anything was possible. Then again, she had thought he was dead after the fall, but it was immaterial. He wasn't avoiding the morgue because of Molly, this Seb, or the large rock that glittered on her finger. Definitely not.  
Molly tugged a comb through her hair and dabbed tiredly at her face with a washcloth.  
"Long day?" She heard a voice rumble behind her.  
She turned to find Seb staring at her, hands on his hips. She nodded in affirmation.  
"Was he being a jerk again?"  
"Sherlock? No. He hasn't been in lately. I'm just tired of this serial killer case. Today I had to autopsy a little boy. A little boy, Seb! What kind of sadistic person would kill a little kid? The number and letter were on…" She shuddered, a tear sliding down her face.  
"I'm sorry sweet." He murmured against her neck, wrapping an arm around her waist. "You say Sherlock hasn't been in?"  
Molly looked at him quizzically.  
"Um, no. Lestrade said he barely communicates about the case. Lost interest or something."  
"That's not good. I'm sorry you have to work on these."  
Molly burrowed her face into his bare neck and cried.  
John awoke to the sound of low, hoarse screaming filling his flat. Needless to say, it wasn't the most pleasant of alarms. He flew down the steps to the flat beneath his and banged open the door. If Sherlock were conducting some infernal experiment at six am he would strangle him. He found his friend on the couch, eyes clenched tightly shut, sweat rolling in beads down his forehead. A crime scene photo, the list of letters and numbers, and a pack of cigarettes sat on the side table. The letters had pilled up, a letter L with a little boy, another L with a lady in her sixties, a letter D with a known drug dealer. None of the victims were connected to each other. Sherlock had been working tirelessly to see how they fit. The nightmares had started with the third victim, a teenage boy. John wasn't sure of what happened in the dreams, but he knew they were bad.  
"Sherlock!" He shouted. "Wake up!" He shook his friend roughly by the shoulders. Sherlock shouted again, this time directly in John's ear. The doctor gripped Sherlock's arm and pulled with all the force in his body. The detective toppled off the couch and on to the floor with a bang. He awoke, gasping for breath, eyes wide.  
"Another?" John asked.  
Sherlock nodded and John could see the weariness in his friend's eyes. It was quickly replaced by his usual detachedness.  
"The new murder?"  
"How did you know? I got the text on the stairs."  
"Doesn't matter. What did Lestrade say?"  
John pulled his phone from his dressing gown, thankful he had slipped it into his pocket before galloping down the stairs.  
"All it says is 'New murder. No need to come to the crime scene. Wait at Bart's.'"  
Sherlock nodded, stretched himself like a cat, and reached for his discarded clothing.  
"Coming?" He asked when he was halfway out the door.  
John shook his head.  
"Later. Go ahead."


	4. Chapter 4

**Here we are! The penultimate chapter. **

Sherlock paced impatiently.

"Why doesn't Lestrade want me to come to the crime scene?" He all but roared. Molly shrugged.

"Not necessary I guess."

Sherlock sent her a withering glance.

"If I'm not necessary, why did he tell me to come here?"

Molly gave a dismissive wave of the hand. Sherlock noticed that the large diamond and the two tiny rubies on her ring caught the light and bounced it back. How annoying.

"Is there anything you want to work on, while we wait?"

He gave a single shake of his head and settled in to wait.

Forty minutes passed and Lestrade still did not make an appearance. Sherlock heard a jangling sound and glanced up to see Molly answer her phone.

"Hello? Oh hi Seb." Sherlock rolled his eyes. Not this again.

"Absolutely. I should wait for this body to come in, then I should be home."

Enough was enough. He couldn't stand to have Molly chatting away while he was concentrating.

"Molly!" He growled. "If you must continue this inane conversation with whatshisname, then do it elsewhere. I have more important things to do."

"I'll talk to you later, love. Be home soon. Yep, I love you too. Bye."

Her cheerful voice changed the second she hung up her phone.

"Excuse me?"

Sherlock's very face was a challenge.

"Do you have to act like a giggling schoolgirl every time he calls? There are much more important things than your silly love life. Such as this case."

"Fine, Sherlock. I'll go. But don't expect me to help you out when you need the body autopsied." Molly gathered her things and stomped angrily out the door.

Molly trudged up the stairs to her flat. She was exhausted, both emotionally and physically drained. Why did he have to be such a jerk all the time? Molly pushed open the door to her flat and toed her flats off. She dropped her coat and purse on the floor, no longer caring. She wanted nothing more than to go to sleep and stay that way for quite a while.

"That you babe?" Seb's voice called from the kitchen.

She mumbled an unintelligible string of words in reply. She felt strange, lightheaded and dizzy. Now that she thought about it, she had felt strange since she and Seb had gone for lunch. The feeling was suddenly exacerbated, a whirling sensation pervaded her head. She heard Seb come out to the hall.

"Y'alright?" He asked.

She shook her head. Why did her head feel so dizzy…so fuzzy. Why was she going to faint?

"Must have eaten something off at lunch. You should be more careful."

His voice was distant, as if she were hearing him underwater. She felt her knees buckle.

"Careful love, wouldn't want to hurt yourself." She felt herself being scooped into a set of strong arms. And then she fainted.

Sherlock must have fallen asleep. He hadn't remembered being tired, but here he was, in St Bart's morgue, being shaken awake by both John and Lestrade. The DI plunked a dossier in front of Sherlock.

"Photos. Victim was a Judson Thackeray. American. Came to England six weeks ago, looking for his mother. He was born here, adopted by an older couple who then moved to America where he lived from the time he was eleven months. He came to London in the hope of finding his mum, as he recently came into some money and wanted to use it to help her if she needed it. He and a girlfriend, a Constance Boone, went to dinner last night. Constance says he left early, a call about his mum she presumed. He was found by a homeless man at five this morning. An "I" and a 2 were carved into the dirt next to him. Unlike the others, he was not entirely dead. Apparently he said something like "hodie mihi, cras eam." Ring any bells?"

Sherlock's eyes gained a faraway, abstracted look.

"Latin, obviously. Hodie mihi, cras eam."

John looked up suddenly.

" I had only ever heard it with the word 'tibi', which means you. It means 'Today me, tomorrow her.'"


	5. Chapter 5

**Last chapter! I would like to give a huge thank you to my beta, the wonderful cumbersuaded. Thank you dear! **

Seb Moran leaned back into the leather interior of his Mercedes. Yes, it had been a good day. He had killed a man the night before, taken his fiancée out for lunch and drugged her, and was well on his way to killing his greatest enemy. He couldn't think of a day that was better. Molly was still unconscious, curled on the seat next to him. He felt vaguely guilty for having drugged her with such a harsh drug, but quickly pushed the thoughts aside. She was a means to an end. Besides, he didn't intend to kill her unless Holmes was too slow to figure it out. In that case, she was just collateral damage. If he didn't have to kill her he could toy about with her for a while longer, play the sympathetic lover. She was a pretty little thing, and she wouldn't have to know what he had done. The drug was long-lasting, it would remain in effect for a long while. A very good day indeed.  
Sherlock paced the nearly empty halls of Bart's with a cigarette clutched between his fingers.  
"She will die." He said over and over to himself.  
"Who IS she?" He roared, his voice echoing. John looked up, his eyes bleary.  
"Obviously the messages are directed at me. Who is she and how can I save her?" Sherlock slumped to the floor.  
"Why is she important?"  
Suddenly Sherlock sat straight up. His eyes were frantic, worry creasing his face.  
"Molly. Where's Molly?"  
"We don't even know that it's Molly. There's nothing we can do." Lestrade said, trying to keep his voice as even as possible.  
"Don't tell me there's nothing we can do. There is always something we can do." Sherlock's voice was a dangerous, low growl.  
The three, John, Lestrade and Sherlock, were seated in Lestrade's office.  
"The fiancé. Bring up his records." Sherlock said, his voice desperate.  
Lestrade tapped some keys on the keyboard and shook his head.  
"The last name's Moran, right?" He asked John.  
The doctor nodded.  
"Seb Moran. I think his full name is Sebastian."  
Lestrade pecked at the keys a few more times but once again shook his head.  
"No records?" Sherlock groaned.  
Lestrade swiveled the computer screen.  
"There are records. According to this 'Sebastian Moran' died when he was eighteen."  
Sherlock stared at the screen before turning on his heel and all but running out of the room. John knew better than to try to stop him when he had such a frantic look in his eyes.  
John heard the mumbling first.  
"Where is she?"  
John pushed open the door to the flat to find Sherlock seated on the couch, head in hands. He looked up between his fingers and the searching glance scared John more than a little.  
"We'll find her. Nothing will hurt her."  
John nodded soothingly.  
Molly felt herself falling. Over and over again there was the falling. But it wasn't just falling. She had been pushed. Her crazily pinwheeling arms could do nothing to break the inevitable landing, the inevitable death that had to be the result of landing on some unknown surface. Why had he pushed her? Why did his face morph between Seb's and Sherlock's? Why was she falling?  
Sherlock picked the lock to Molly's flat. The criminal, who was without a doubt Molly's fiancé, had locked the door behind him. He could tell by the staggering footsteps that were left in the plush carpet that the man had been carrying a heavy load, deadweight. Sherlock paced the flat, he even crawled through it on his knees.  
"She came home. Stood in the corridor. He came out to meet her. He wears too much cologne. She fell. If that psychopath has already killed her, he won't survive the night."  
Everything he said was murmured under his breath, the whole monologue dusted with colorful profanity.  
Sherlock followed the trail that only he could see outside.  
"They drove away. Where?"  
Sherlock paced up and down with his fingers to his temples.  
"What is his motivation? He isn't your average serial killer, I would have heard of him before. He isn't a Moriarty. Why is he doing what he is doing? The killings are obviously directed at me. Molly is the final straw, the grand finale. But why her?"  
Suddenly he stopped, his lips drawn into a round Cheerio shape.  
"Oh." He murmured. "Aren't you a clever boy."  
John settled into the back of the cab, content to wait. There was no chance of Sherlock's revealing any of his findings now, he was too far gone in his mind palace for that. John looked up curiously when the cab stopped. Bart's? Why Bart's?  
"Stay here. Wait for Lestrade." The look on Sherlock's face garnered no argument.  
Sherlock jumped out of the cab and dashed up the stairs faster than John had previously thought was humanly possible. Sherlock ran through the hospital, each second of time was like a countdown, each heartbeat was potentially Molly's last. He ran until he was on that awful roof. A single laser beam honed in on his chest the instant he burst into sight.  
"It really is quite good of you to come Mr Holmes. I figured you would, sentiment and all."  
Sherlock caught sight of Molly huddled in a drug induced sleep, an incredibly tall man standing next to her. There was the unmistakable bulge of a gun in his coat. An involuntary growl tore from Sherlock's throat and he moved to help her.  
"Ah ah ah, Mr Holmes. I believe you should leave my fiancée where she is."  
Sebastian cocked his gun and pointed it carelessly at Molly's temple. She whimpered in her sleep.  
"I don't want to kill her, but I will. Cooperate and it won't be necessary."  
Sherlock moved slowly backwards, his eyes fixed warily on the cocked gun.  
"There has long been unfinished business with you Mr Holmes. You see, for all of his brilliancy, Jim was unable to accomplish his one object. He couldn't kill you. As the new leader of the criminal syndicate of London I have taken it upon myself to do so. Honestly, you have made it a lot easier than I had thought. I had a hit man set on you, but he was unfortunately incompetent. He had to die, of course. The letters and the numbers were a stroke of genius, if I do say so myself. It occurred to me in a second, but it really was providential. What better way to draw out a detective than to present him with a case?"  
Moran had begun to pace by this point, but his gun remained unswervingly pointed at the crumpled figure of Molly Hooper.  
"Of course, the idea had been all along to kill you. The others were a means to an end. I am not predominantly a killer Mr Holmes, but you had to be killed."  
"If I die, you'll let her go?" Sherlock asked, voice quiet.  
"Of course. Well, for now at least."  
Sherlock nodded meditatively.  
"If I hadn't gotten here would you have killed her?"  
Moran threw his free hand in the air, a deceptively winsome smile on his handsome face.  
"Absolutely. After nightfall, like the others. There was a kind of poetic beauty in your one true love dying in the same spot as you were believed to have died. So very Shakespearean." He sighed melodramatically.  
"You've been very thorough." Moran nodded, poorly hidden pride in his eyes. "But you forgot one thing. I have died on this roof once before. I wouldn't be foolish enough to come without backup."  
Three things happened simultaneously. There was the deafening crack of a gunshot, almost the entirety of New Scotland Yard rushed to the roof, and Sebastian Moran took a swan dive from the roof of Bart's in a manner vaguely reminiscent of a similar fall only a few years before. The laser pointer trained on Sherlock's chest blinked out, apparently the backup had fled at the sight of their leader's fall. The three events suddenly lined up in his mind and Sherlock rushed to where Molly still lay unmoving. There was a pool of dark, sticky liquid slowly forming beneath her. If she was dead… Sherlock rushed to her and quickly searched for the bullet wound. He almost sobbed in relief when he found it, a clean entry through the shoulder. She would be fine. He supported her head in his arms and called for a doctor.  
The next hour passed in a blur. Molly was taken downstairs on a stretcher, she began to rouse from the effects of the drug but a nurse held a mask to her face and she was soon out cold, completely unconscious due to anesthesia. They had taken her to surgery almost immediately. Two burly orderlies and John had to forcibly restrain Sherlock to keep him from going into the operating room. He had paced the hall after that, approaching any nurse or doctor to question about her condition.  
"You can go in now Mr Holmes." Sherlock looked up. He had been nearly asleep on his feet.  
"The surgery has been done for a while. You can sit with her if you'd like." He nodded and followed the scrub-clad nurse to the hospital room.  
Molly was draped across the bed, her face pale, eyes closed, her left shoulder swathed in bandages.  
"She should be awake soon."  
The nurse turned to leave but hesitated for a second.  
"Call me if you need anything. You are a very lucky man Mr Holmes."  
Sherlock made his way to the uncomfortable plastic chair that sat beside the hospital bed. He glanced at Molly's hand, which lay on top of the white blanket. The blue veins stood out in stark contrast to the deathly pale skin.  
He had no idea how long he had been sitting there. A minute? An hour? All night? He heard a gasping intake of breath and looked up from where he was bent over his mobile. Molly's eyes were open slightly, the pain still evident on her face, though it was lessened now.  
"You're awake." He said simply. "John said you can stay in Baker Street until you're well again."  
She nodded weakly and stretched out her hand to his.  
"I'm sorry." He said, voice hoarse. "I tried. I tried to stop him, tried to stop him from hurting you."  
He was never able to pass that roof without looking up at it and standing transfixed for a moment. It was a reminder, not just of when he died, but also of when she had almost died as well. He was never able to pass that roof without seeing that long coat billowing in the wind as Moran fell, and he could only imagine that John had felt the same way for a number of years. Walking those stairs reminded him, each time, of the time he had ran up them, each heartbeat a reminder that she could die any instant. But they were also a reminder of good things. An unintentional meeting, an unusual friendship, a snog in a broom closet, a less than romantic marriage proposal, a baby on it's way. And for these, he was eternally grateful.


End file.
